


A Better Time

by oilslickrainbow



Category: Watchmen - All Media Types
Genre: Gen, Nostalgia, Short
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-14
Updated: 2017-08-14
Packaged: 2018-12-15 08:51:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 339
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11802675
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/oilslickrainbow/pseuds/oilslickrainbow
Summary: Rorschach reminisces.





	A Better Time

Nostalgia.

There are billboards and posters all around town, crass obscenities featuring half-naked men and women. Rorschach wants to deface them. There are commercials on every television channel, playing jazz standards he knows but has never cared for, shot in monochrome that's a little too gray. He wants them to stop.

But the name makes him wonder.

He longs for a better time. A time when people worked hard and looked out for one another. A time when people knew their neighbors and left their doors unlocked. A time when they looked to the future with hope, not fear. A time when art was beautiful, movies told stories and literature nourished the intellect. A time when society was coherent and the county strong, respected by allies and enemies alike even without empty threats.

It's a world he doesn't remember. Then and there, people like him were never permitted, and it was all the better for it. People like him weren't needed. He'd give anything to have it back but there is nothing he can do.

His own past, too, was a brighter time, if not quite as radiant or as clean. He had friends, friends in other people who cared about doing what was right and who fought alongside him. Back then it seemed like the war could be won. Perhaps if things had been different it could have been. Back then every battle won was a victory in itself.

When he finds the bottle in an old friend's house, he takes it with him. When he is alone in a dark alleyway, listening to the roar of traffic and staring at a picture of a woman with a beckoning look in her kohl-rimmed eyes, he opens it, lifts up his face and breathes in. For a few seconds, there is no woman, no alleyway and no Rorschach. For a few seconds, the darkness turns to light and the city is clean.

He won't wear it. It's not meant for people like him. He keeps the bottle with him.


End file.
